The combination of Western Diet and Binge Drinking on Brain Health

The Western diet, characterized by high amounts of saturated fat and simple sugars with low omega-3 fatty acids and fiber content, has become increasingly prevalent worldwide due to the global availability of inexpensive, processed foods. Concurrently, binge drinking has emerged as a common pattern of alcohol consumption, particularly among young adults. Western Diet alone is linked to neurodegenerative diseases and negative brain health outcomes while binge drinking, and alcoholism can cause neurodegeneration without any nutritional deficiency. Yet, the combination of these two together, commonly seen amongst college students, and their impacts on the brain are poorly understood. To address this gap, we observed the combination of binge drinking and Western diet on the brain and hypothesized this combination to cause a more rapid or severe detriment to brain health than either alone. This was accomplished through a 12-week experiment using young (6 week old) male and female C57BL/6J mice. Mice were assigned to one of four groups (n=15-18/sex/group): Control, Control/Binge, Western, or Western/Binge where Western diet mice were provided diet and water ad libitum with binge drinking mice receiving a 20% w/v ethanol solution 3-6hrs/day, 3-4 days/week, to simulate binge drinking. Enzymatic assays along with qPCR were used to measure brain inflammatory states following the 12- week treatment. Brain lipid peroxidation was significantly elevated in the Western and Western/Binge groups in both sexes while brain glutathione activity showed a reduced trend in these groups. Both of these measurements are indicative of oxidative stress in the brain. The little difference seen between Western and Western/Binge groups proposes that Western diet is a more prominent driver of neuroinflammation, but it is thought that molecular markers of disease will differ between Western and Western/Binge groups, and this data through qPCR is forthcoming. These findings highlight the neuroinflammatory consequences of Western dietary patterns and underscore the importance of understanding their interaction with binge alcohol exposure for long-term brain health. This abstract was presented at the American Physiology Summit 2026 and is only available in HTML format. There is no downloadable file or PDF version. The Physiology editorial board was not involved in the peer review process.